Report of lawmaker's accident was prank

Published 2:10 pm, Sunday, April 1, 2012

HARTFORD (AP) -- An official in Gov. Dannel P. Malloy's administration says a Twitter posting he wrote about a state lawmaker being hospitalized after a car accident was an April Fools' Day prank.

Malloy's chief criminal justice aide, Michael Lawlor, posted on Twitter Sunday morning that West Haven Democratic Rep. Stephen Dargan was in the hospital after a car accident. Lawlor told The Associated Press that it was just an April Fools' Day joke.

Dargan told the New Haven Register that he tries to come up with an April Fools' Day prank every year. He says Sunday's prank wasn't supposed to go public.

Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro once fell victim to Lawlor and Dargan's pranks when she sent flowers to Lawlor, after Dargan had announced that Lawlor was hospitalized when he wasn't.